


the chariots, they rise

by nerdyglow



Category: Rush (2013)
Genre: Caring, Cravings, Cute, Fluff, M/M, Mood Swings, Mpreg, Pregnancy, Snark
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-11-20
Updated: 2013-11-25
Packaged: 2018-01-02 04:37:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1052608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerdyglow/pseuds/nerdyglow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sort-of-alternate-timeline for <i>i am lost, i am vain</i>, where Niki's crash at Nürburgring never happened and the bond/pregnancy is not an issue. That is, a bunch of shameless fluffy, smutty, sweet drabbles to unbreak my heart. Rating will change.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [i am lost, i am vain, i will never be the same](https://archiveofourown.org/works/981267) by [nerdyglow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerdyglow/pseuds/nerdyglow). 



> What it says on the tin. Essentially, a whole lot of fluff and smut to heal the wounds caused by _i am lost, i am vain_. No explanation needed. They keep the kid. Niki is fine. We're all happy and no one cries. :)
> 
> Not RPF, no connection to the real pilots, clearly never happened, I have nothing but respect for them and this is _Rush_ fanfic and all that stuff.
> 
> Some of the ideas which will become chapters belong to my beloved [Quimfoolery](http://quimfoolery.tumblr.com), whom I have spent the past two months yelling with about Hunt/Lauda porn and fluff. She is amazing. This first chapter was originally her idea. We ran with it.
> 
> Also this will only be rated T for three chapters at the most. There will be smut. I just didn't want to rate it E immediately and put all pregnant sex tags and stuff, and then disappoint everyone with the lack of smut in the first chapter. 
> 
> Title taken from 'Chariots Rise' by Lizzie West.

Niki isn't beside James when he wakes up in the pitch dark at 3.14am. James lies quietly, listening intently for the delightful sounds of Niki being extremely ill in the bathroom (as he's been doing quite frequently over the past month, although it has been petering out recently), but he hears nothing. There is, however, a shuffling, clanking sound coming from downstairs. 

James gets up, dragging the duvet with him and plods down the stairs. He's rubbing sleepily at his face as he enters the kitchen, but when he takes his hand away, he breaks into a grin.

Niki is illuminated in the light from the fridge, where he is standing in his dressing gown eating a jar of pickles.

James can't help but chuckle at the scandalised look on Niki's face, his hand frozen with his fingers in the jar, as if he's been caught doing something completely heinous instead of just eating bizarre things in the middle of the night. He goes over to kiss Niki's forehead and then sits down on a kitchen chair, wrapping the duvet around himself.

“Are you all right?” he asks, leaning his cheek on his palm and looking over at his mate. The way Niki's belly has begun to curve hypnotizes him (as it always does) and he lets his eyes linger there for a second before looking up at Niki's face.

“Mmf,” Niki tells him, finishing his mouthful of pickle and swallowing. “I was hungry.”

“So I see.” James notices an empty tub of ice cream on the counter top. “Pickles and ice cream. Interesting combination, Niki.”

“Piss off.” Niki says, putting the jar of pickles back in the fridge and the spoon in the sink. “There wasn't anything else I wanted to eat.” 

He comes over to James in his bare feet, so close his knees are touching James's duvet-covered thigh. James extricates one hand from his cocoon and wraps it around Niki, pulling him against his side. During early pregnancy, the omega needs to be touched almost constantly by their Alpha. James read it in this book he bought the week after he found out. 

“What would you have had, if you could have anything?” James asks, leaning over to nuzzle his head against Niki's belly. The bump isn't big yet, not at all – but it's convex and hard and unmistakeably _there_. Niki huffs softly and rests his weight on James.

“Peanut butter.” he says quietly.

“Would you eat that out of the jar, too?”

“Yes.”

James has to laugh. He can imagine Niki eating peanut butter with a spoon all too clearly.

“Tomorrow I'll go and get you some.”

He shuffles, letting the duvet fall so he can pull Niki into his lap, still half-asleep. One hand goes automatically to Niki's stomach and curls gently there, the other rubs at Niki's lower back, which he knows has been painful for the past few days (because Niki didn't stop complaining about it for the best part of two hours). Niki rests his chin atop James's head and sighs softly.

“Niki, your breath stinks of vinegar.”

Niki gives James a vicious poke in the side through the duvet and James holds him tighter.

“Did I say I minded?” he teases, “Let's go back to bed. You need to rest, you know...” He gives the bump a tiny, gentle squeeze.

“I'm not a delicate flower,” Niki says crossly. James has heard him say similar things so many times in the past month, so he rolls his eyes and nudges Niki up off his lap. He suspects Niki will be insisting this right up until the day. The day they become parents.

“Yes you are.” he says. “Now, go and clean your teeth.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise I am working on the seventh chapter of _i am lost_ , but to be honest, writing it is like pressing a bruise so it may be a little while yet. In the meantime, more pregnant fluff for you. No smut yet, but it's coming next chapter and I'm working (with [Quimfoolery](quimfoolery.tumblr.com) who helps me with the best ideas - the tuna sandwich thing is hers, by the way) on about a thousand other fics and AUs, most of them multi-chaptered and all of them full of smut.
> 
> Ugh, I need three months off work and a whole lot of coffee and wine so I can get all the fic in my head out onto paper. Alas.
> 
> Anyway! Enough faffing, here is the fluffy rambling.

One of the first things James does when he finds out Niki is pregnant is go out and buy a book.

It's called _Omega Male Pregnancy: Week By Week_ and James reads it from cover to cover as soon as he gets home, ignoring Niki when he rolls his eyes and protests that it isn't necessary.

“Omegas have been pregnant for centuries without books, James. Surely you do not need to be reading an account of every single thing that's going to happen to my body. It's happening right in front of you!” Niki rants, sitting wrapped up in James's blue cardigan in the armchair while James stretches out on the sofa with his feet up. 

“Mood swings,” James says with a glint in his eye, flipping to the index and running his finger down the page, then turns back and reads, “From the very first day of pregnancy, an omega male will experience extreme changes in mood. You can expect to be overjoyed one moment and in tears the next. You may also become aggressive towards those around you – even your Alpha.” 

He looks meaningfully at Niki over the top of the book.

“I was aggressive towards you before you got me pregnant.” Niki points out, and James grins.

“True,” he says jovially, and goes back to reading.

*

When Niki runs from the room gagging at the smell of a tuna sandwich, James reaches for the book again. He carries it around in his back pocket, because he wants to be sure about every single thing Niki does. Whether or not it's just him, or a sympton of pregnancy, or both. Most of the time, he can't work it out.

James takes out a yellow highlighter pen and blocks out the paragraph that talks about the omega becoming more sensitive to certain foods and certain odours. Then he writes 'fish' in the margin. 

After a moment's contemplation, he highlights a paragraph on the opposite page about the omega's body temperature increase during this particular week, and then gets one of many jars of peanut butter out of the cupboard.

“I'm sorry,” he says to Niki later as he lies in bed, avidly watching Niki get undressed. “I didn't know fish would make you feel ill.” 

“It doesn't matter,” Niki says. “I felt fine as soon as I could not smell it.” James watches him put on his pyjama trousers. The way he arranges them comfortably below the curve of his belly, which would be unnoticeable to anyone but James and possibly Marlene.

He worries sometimes that he might be a terrible father. If he's giving Niki foods that make him sick, how is he going to cope with a tiny thing that's entirely dependent on the two of them for it's survival? He'll probably end up poisoning it, and he says as much to Niki as Niki joins him in bed.

“Do you think I'll be a shitty father?” he asks after Niki turns out the light and curls up against him.

(They sleep like this every night now, James pressed against Niki's back, hands cupping his stomach.)

“Don't be ridiculous.” Niki mutters, sounding decidedly un-sleepy and rather cross.

“But if I can't even remember to give you the right things to eat...”

“James. Shut up.” Niki turns over in bed, puts his hand on James's cheek. “I'm scared, too. But you will not be a shitty father. I can tell that every instinct inside you wants to protect me, yes?”

“Yes.” James admits. It's part of the reason he has the book. Anything out of the ordinary – he will know immediately and he can do something about it.

“That instinct means you protect the baby, too.” 

“I know.”

“So it will be fine.” 

Niki has never been one to mince words, and James is comforted for the moment. He's also uncomfortably warm. Niki's body is fever-hot, a little like it had been in his heat, and James can feel sweat on his neck. The book is on his bedside table, and James switches the light on, grabbing it to re-read the paragraph he'd highlighted in the kitchen.

' _You may experience hot flashes, especially at night. These can last from seconds up to thirty minutes, and can be very uncomfortable. The head, neck and chest are most commonly affected, and you may sweat as your body tries to cool down._ '

Niki moans in protest, pulling the covers over his head. James snaps off the light again and waits. 

He only has to wait a moment before Niki throws the covers away and strips himself of his loose pyjama shirt, throwing it across the room.

“I am dying.” he declares.

“What is it, sweet?” James asks innocently.

“I just told you. I am burning up and I am going to die.”

“It's normal.” James tells him, more than a little smugly, and pulls the covers away from Niki's legs so he can kick off his pyjama trousers. The sweat gleaming on Niki's chest in the weak light from the window is beautiful and James has to look away – he'd certainly be slapped at if he tried to initiate any touching right now. “You'll get hot flashes at night for the next week or so. And perhaps after the baby is born.”

Niki lies down on top of the sheet with a put-upon sigh, and James fans his face gently with his hand. Niki opens one eye and gives him a weak but grateful smile.

*

By Niki's twentieth week, the book is almost entirely covered with yellow highlighter. By the twenty-first week, all the pages fall out after James drops it in the bath.

James panics, of course. Niki snaps that people _were_ actually able to give birth without a stupid book in years gone by.

Marlene laughs and buys James a second copy.


End file.
